Lansing-Dreiden-The Incomplete Triangle:Album Of The Year?

"The Dividing Island is Lansing-Dreiden's second full-length album, just recently released May 9th on Kemado Records. Live, L-D Section II are astonishing and refreshing, especially with their new line up bringing hints of shoegazed synth pop struts with new lead singers Sect and Ion. L-D Section I, a 9-pc band that performed Lansing-Dreiden's music in a live setting had sold-out shows in New York, Seattle, and Austin. This will also mark the debut of L-D Section II playing in selected cities."

well, duh, i finally actually read the voice live review that tim linked to. looks cool. and i like that review.

All they had to say for themselves was "Please don't be mean to us, we're just trying to have fun!" They're limp liberal-arts kids looking for fame, as childish and childlike as Len. But they've been to school and been around enough to know the easiest road to a reputation: courting overzealous tossbags with ambiguity and obfuscation. Lansing-Dreiden continue to build the biggest, whitest slate for pseuds to write spiraling academic architecture - the fait accompli that buttresses the band's naive thievery of thoughts and forms they don't even completely understand. They might as well have called their album P-KKt3.

that would be a good title too!

the pitchfork reviews are the only ones that read like that though.

"They're limp liberal-arts kids looking for fame"

aren't they already successful designers? and every one of their actions as musicmakers leads me to believe that fame is the last thing on their minds.

I don't know if this is a good record or not. It's not really my stylistic bag, but the clips on AMG sounded nice. Maybe it falls apart on closer inspection, but at the very least the songs are pretty lovely compositions (if emphemerally so).

I understand that this kind of music is Ott's turf and I can understand wanting to defend it, but I think there's something to be said for competent, interesting music, no matter how derivative, no matter how boring / pretentious the creators.

maybe that's just what they are though. i take their word for it. they put out a newspaper, they design stuff, they make cool music. i don't think they are frauds. looks like they are having fun AND actually doing stuff! frauds are usually kinda lazy.

it's definitely my turf! if i had turf. and i say thumbs up. i confess, i don't know what ott's turf is. but he is hung up on indie cred or something, and that's just silly. and, yeah, the extra-musical stuff really doesn't affect me. i'm aware of it, cuz i've read stuff, but it's not what i think about when i play the songs.

Similarly, you use the adjective "lifeless" to describe their songs, which I find convenient given some of the stylistic attributes of the music (i.e., New Wave as cold, robotic, etc.). Again, though, the description is meant as a criticism of the QUALITY of the music, and unless you are criticizing the New Wave/New Wave Revivalism aesthetic of coldness/roboticism/etc. in general (i.e., Nick Heyward's vocals sucked because they were too LIFELESS), I'm not sure why the criticism is particularly relevant to Lansing-Dreiden.

This is the entirety of your critique in that review apart from an accusation of "grotesque orchestrations," of which you do not cite an example.

Hey All,

We are doing a show as part of the "Starbucks Salon" series tomorrow at
7pm. The show is free. Here is the info:

L-D Section II - 7pm
Starbucks Salon
76 Greene St.
FREE

Hope you can come!

L-D

what to do

Just a quick reminder about our show at Hiro Ballroom tonight...

Also wanted to mention that we'll have copies of our new CD 'D.I. by
D.D.' available at the show.

Hope you all can make it!

And I only know the Beta Band's 3 eps release, but I can't say I see the similarities.